


Gravity

by Vagrant_Blvrd



Series: Between the Stars [5]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, The Mandalorian (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-15
Updated: 2021-03-15
Packaged: 2021-03-24 05:55:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,996
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30067689
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vagrant_Blvrd/pseuds/Vagrant_Blvrd
Summary: The first time it happens, Luke hasn’t slept in nearly three days and has gotten himself in what many would refer to as a “situation.”
Relationships: Din Djarin/Luke Skywalker
Series: Between the Stars [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2196822
Comments: 19
Kudos: 204





	Gravity

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt fill for Anon who asked for the way you said “i love you” (as a thank you) with a few more off [this prompt list](https://goodluckdetective.tumblr.com/post/143772299650/the-way-you-said-i-love-you) thrown in. 
> 
> Because reasons. :D?

The first time it happens, Luke hasn’t slept in nearly three days and has gotten himself in what many would refer to as a “situation.”

========

“I love you,” Luke says, face mashed against Din’s shoulder as he hauls Luke out of a detention cell in an Imperial base.

He means to say _hi_ and _I didn’t expect to see you here_ and _thank you_ but somehow the words get all jumbled up in his head and it’s what he ends up saying instead.

They’ve known one another for a while, become something Luke likes to think of as friends in the back of his head. Have gotten into enough trouble together and apart that Luke thinks he can be excused with the lack of sleep and relief at seeing a friendly face again after too long without.

Well, helmet. 

Whatever.

Din stumbles, and Luke starts to lift his head to see what caused it, but Din mutters something about debris, and anyway, Luke’s past running on fumes by that point.

“Sounds about right,” he says, trusting Din to get them out, which he does of course.

When they get to Din’s ship, he parks Luke in one of the bunks on his ship and turns to Grogu who looks upset for some reason.

“Keep an eye on him for me,” Din says, and stares at Luke for a long moment when Luke tells him of course he will. 

Luke blinks up at him, not sure what he did to elicit that response. Grogu coos and pats the back of Luke’s hand gently.

“I was talking to the kid,” Din says, soft, like he’s smiling. “But thanks, I appreciate it.” 

Oh.

Din shakes his head as he heads to the cockpit because Imperial base and Imperial stormtroopers and most annoyingly, TIE-fighter pilots with their TIE-fighters, and anyway.

========

The second time it happens, Luke is sleep-deprived. 

Again.

========

This time, however, has less to do with Imperial remnants and more to do with the horrific amount of red-tape involved with starting his school.

Or, really, unraveling the mess of turning a former Rebel Alliance base into a school.

Not as easy as it sounds, really, because of course it’s not.

One thing for the New Republic to grant his request, another to get everything squared away so he won’t have to worry about legal issues later on.

“Here,” Din says, and Luke looks up in surprise as he puts a mug of tea in front of him. “I would have made kaf, but someone broke the machine.”

Okay, _look_.

Desperate people do desperate things. After a week of wrestling with bureaucrats and time differences between Yavin 4 and Coruscant and everywhere in between, Luke didn’t see the harm in seeing if he could tweak the kaf maker.

It was old anyway, and Luke remembers it was always temperamental back when he was stationed here. Who’s to say Luke’s tinkering is what broke it, really?

Din is judging him.

Has been for a while now, but it’s blatantly obvious now in the way he’s looking at Luke. 

Shiny, shiny helmet tilted just so, and anyway, Luke doesn’t need the Force to know the man’s amused.

“Thanks,” Luke says, taking the mug from Din.

It’s warm, just this side of hot that Luke likes, hands wrapping around the body of the mug. Luke takes a sip of his tea and sighs as warmth spreads through him, tension from dealing with a million and one small inconveniences melting away.

“I love you,” he says to his tea, an old dumb joke, and looks up with a smile on his face to explain the story behind it to Din and stops before the words leave his mouth.

Because Din.

Staring at Luke before he looks away and a flash of something through the Force at the corner of awareness that comes and goes too fast for Luke to grasp it. Slipping away from him when he chases it, and the way Din turns his head away.

“Din?”

Din clears his throat. 

“What did you have in mind for today?” he asks in a painfully clear subject change.

There’s a moment, brief and selfish where Luke wants to ignore it, but Din still isn’t looking at him, tension in his shoulders Luke doesn’t like seeing.

Luke glances down at Grogu, who snuck out to keep Luke company hours ago. He’s dozing, tips of his ears poking out from the nest Luke made for him out of his cloak, and snuffling quietly.

“Lighting?” 

They have a lot of work to do before the school can be anything close to ready, and lighting’s been an issue since day one.

Din nods and pushes to his feet. Luke watches as he collects Grogu.

“I’ll get Grogu situated and meet you back here?”

Luke finds himself copying Din’s nod and watches him leave with Grogu with the feeling he’s just missed something important.

========

The third time - _well_.

========

This time, Luke is in one of those “situations” as a favor to the New Republic courtesy of Leia, and honestly, things just kept happening until Luke finds himself staring into a bottomless chasm.

A group of bandits playing at Imperials and a world where too many ships ended crashing to be explained away as coincidence.

“Why do I let you get me into these things?” Din asks, because he’s there too. Not pleased about it, but he’s still there.

Also?

“Um,” Luke says, because Din is suddenly very much in his personal space. “Din, what - “

Din sighs, incredibly judgmental all of a sudden.

“I have a jetpack.”

Luke squints at him.

“...And?” he asks, but hey, okay, the bandits catch up to them and they’re still feeling shooty, and then Din’s scooping him up and oh, right, _jetpack_.

“I love you,” Luke says, that thing where his words get all jumbled up in his head again because there’s a lot going on and it’s understandable under the circumstances.

Still. 

Din’s arms around him tighten, his head comes down until their eyes meet.

Luke is sure Din’s about to say something, but the bandits and their shooty tendencies and Din lets out a low sigh of frustration instead.

“Hold on,” he says, pulling Luke closer to him, voice in Luke’s ear, and they jump.

========

The fourth time it’s not so much spoken as it is a quiet understanding between them.

========

Luke would like it to be known this is in no way his fault. 

“Helpful,” Din says, sounding utterly miserable. 

Because a nasty storm on a planet far from home and the two of them taking shelter in a cave to wait it out before it clears and they can leave.

Also, old enemies of Din’s that tracked them here, and anyway. 

Long story short, Din’s sick.

Enough so that Luke’s sporting a blindfold cut from his cloak to allow Din to remove his helmet, and he’s still so judgmental.

Voice rough and scratchy and somehow still fondly exasperated.

Luke huffs, but doesn’t move away when Din pulls him to his side and settles the emergency blanket from their kit around his shoulders.

========

The fifth time Luke leaves a message.

========

It’s not so much a “situation” as it’s a disaster.

Because politics and the galaxy’s last known Jedi and anyway.

Leia apologizes even as she keeps the worst of it from him, sharp smiles and pointed words and subtle threats no one can ever prove.

He’s been away from Yavin 4 and the school for too long, and still so much to do. Din has it all under control, him and Mara and the others Luke’s snatched up here and there and gathered to him as precious people.

Records holos to send to them, keep them apprised on matters and so on.

And sometimes he just...rambles.

Packs up the official holos for the school and gets them ready to send, but there’s still this ache in his chest, a longing he can’t soothe with the meditation techniques he knows or burn out of him in training.

Long nights on a world with alien stars above him and no other recourse and all these things he can’t find the words for face-to-face and it’s just easier this way.

The week before he’s set to go back to Yavin he records one last holo, ends it with a small smile and words he’s said before, but didn’t mean the way he does now but has held in his heart for longer than he realized. 

The day before he leaves Coruscant he receives a package from Yavin 4 with a note from Din, an echo of the holo that finally, finally, calms the ache in his chest.

========

After that Luke can’t keep track, and he’s sure Din can’t either, because the words are there every day in so many ways it would be impossible to do so.

========

“Solo’s a bad influence,” Din says, smile in his voice as he settles down to watch Luke work on one of the speeders. 

It’s old. Battered. 

Anyone else would have sold it for ages ago or scrapped it themselves, and yet Luke insists on keeping it around even though it’s constantly in need of work, not unlike a certain light freighter they’re both familiar with.

Sentimental reasons, maybe. Luke remembers using it back during the war when this was still a Rebel Alliance base. He’d been pleasantly surprised when they found it again, in good enough shape to use in the early days of building the school.

Luke pushes out from under the speeder to give Din a look, his own smile tucked into the corners of his mouth. “So are you,” he says, because Grogu has clearly picked up some of his father’s habits.

He’s not the only one because all the students love Din. Think he’s the best the way they think all the others are too, young and bright and so much potential in them it hurts to see sometimes.

Din huffs a laugh but doesn’t deny it, and Luke’s smile widens in response.

There’s a small, tired grumble, both of them watching Grogu toddle into the hangar. He stops when he realizes they’re watching him, ears low, and raises his arms at Din in a familiar gesture.

Luke slides back under the speeder as Din goes to pick Grogu up, laughter slightly muffled as Din goes back to his spot with Grogu held in his arms.

It’s familiar, this.

Grogu sounds like he’s having the same old conversation with Din about being awake at such an early hour, the sun barely up and everyone else still asleep. Din may not understand exactly what Grogu's saying like this, but the tone is unmistakable.

That and he knows his son well enough to know hold up his end of things to keep the conversation going.

It’s unbearably endearing, especially since this is Grogu and Luke knows he and Din are having two entirely different conversations.

“Hey,” Luke says, realizing too late his tools are just out of reach and unable to move unless he ants a face full of hydraulic fluid. “Can you hand me the hydro - “

Din puts the hydrospanner into Luke’s hand before he can finish the sentence, hands brushing deliberately enough that Luke tips his head back to see Din looking down at Luke, head tilted just so.

What Luke means to say is _oh, hi_ , and _come here often?_ and _thanks_ but somehow the words get all jumbled up in his head and what he says instead is, “I love you.”

And Din, who’s heard the story from Han and Leia and Boba Fett a dozen times over by now, says softly, quietly, “I know,” like he’s laughing at Luke under his helmet, which.

_Menace_

Still, though. 

Luke doesn’t take his words back, doesn’t think he ever can with how much he means them with everything he is, does, and he’s lucky enough that Din feels the same towards him.


End file.
